The integrated, ‘primary’ Blast Furnace-Basic Oxygen Furnace (BF-BOF) route is the dominant iron and steel production configuration.

Despite its high CO2 emissions resulting from the use of large amounts of iron ore, mostly with low iron content, and limited amounts of scrap, blast furnace technology remains a crucial component of the iron and steel production process. Rapid greenhouse gas emissions reduction requires the gradual conversion of existing plants and infrastructure.

That is why we have developed the ‘blue blast furnace’ technology as a bridging technology to a greener future in steel production.

The defining feature of the blue blast furnace and the first main step towards EASyMelt is the generation of syngas and its injection through a new bustle pipe at the lower shaft portion of the blast furnace to achieve emission reductions of up to 28%.

Synthesis gas – or syngas – consists primarily of carbon monoxide and hydrogen and performs as a reducing gas to enable a reduction of the iron burden in the shaft, thus replacing coke.

The gas may be produced via a variety of technologies. One is a new reforming process, the so-called dry reforming of coke oven gas in reformer stoves, during which blast furnace gas and coke oven gas are re-formed at a high temperature.

Since the process only uses exhaust gases from the steel plant and can replace coal, the potential to reduce CO2 is high. Apart from the reformer stoves, there are other available technologies to produce syngas, like the reforming of natural gas or coke oven gas and tar.